Gleason: Burke feels right at home at Civic Center

Jesse Longmire walked into the Glens Falls Civic Center for the first time two years ago. He looked around with eyes wide open, the way most teenagers do when they step inside the Mecca of New York state high school hoops, and mouthed a single three-letter word.

Jesse Longmire walked into the Glens Falls Civic Center for the first time two years ago. He looked around with eyes wide open, the way most teenagers do when they step inside the Mecca of New York state high school hoops, and mouthed a single three-letter word.

"Wow.''

Wow indeed. Longmire and John S. Burke Catholic will once again grace the Civic Center. The Eagles draw the breakfast special against Amityville of Long Island, winner to Sunday's 1:30 p.m. final for the Class A title, and if anyone can handle the 9 a.m. start it should be the team making its fourth straight trip to the final four of the state boys' basketball tournament.

"We are used to it,'' Longmire said.

Maybe so, but you can only grow so accustomed to playing in the Civic Center. The court is long, with airy backgrounds behind the baskets, unlike most gyms with walls set close to the hoops. It creates a different depth perception for shooters, no small adjustment on frayed nerves. But the real culture shock comes wrapped amid a combination of crowd size, reverberating sound that exaggerates crowd noise and, of course, the stakes of a lifetime. All together they can reach up and grab kids by the throat and turn the best of ballers into bumbling biddie players.

"When you first step on the floor, it is nerve-wracking, there's no doubt about it,'' said Richie Douglas, who helped Burke reach the Class B title game in 2010 and win it all in 2011. Asked when those nerves dissipate, he said, "You hope that it's during warm-ups, but I think a lot of time it's the first 2 minutes of the game.''

Douglas had his share of memorable moments on the Civic Center hardwood. There was a miracle steal he made down the stretch of the final his junior year, a play in which Syracuse Westhill somehow responded from to win the plaque. The next year he had a hand in Burke's remarkable second-half comeback from a double-digit deficit to beat Potsdam.

"Then toward the end of the game, when Brendan Miller dunked on a fast break, I knew we had it,'' Douglas said.

Glens Falls memories. Douglas still has them. Longmire is trying to add to them.

"It's overwhelming,'' Longmire said, talking about the Civic Center again, "especially for me as a sophomore.''

Now he's the savvy senior with something more to offer than a fierce rebounder oozing energy. Longmire and Stan Buczek are Burke's only players in their third seasons of contributing mightily to Civic Center runs. Guard Kyle Smith, a late-season jayvee call-up in 2011, is the other Burke player making his third trip to Glens Falls.

"I just tell (teammates) to be calm, don't let the atmosphere and the fans and the whole situation overwhelm you,'' Longmire said. "Just act like you've been there before.''

Longmire has been there before, twice before. So have Buczek and Smith, three Burke kids trying to take a title home from the Glens Falls Civic Center.